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Video: Disaster Recovery for Hyper-V Virtual Machines

April 20, 2019 by Jason Aw Leave a Comment

Disaster Recovery for Hyper-V Virtual Machines

Disaster Recovery for Hyper-V Virtual Machines

Watch how quickly you can add disaster recovery protection to your Hyper-V environment in a few easy steps using SIOS DataKeeper Standard Edition.

Filed Under: News and Events Tagged With: disaster recovery - DR, Hyper V

SIOS Delivers Continuous Availability & Disaster Recovery Protection

April 4, 2018 by Jason Aw Leave a Comment

SIOS SANless Cluster Delivers Continuous Availability & Disaster Recovery Protection

Case Study: Van de Lande BV — SIOS DataKeeper

SIOS DataKeeper Cluster Edition enables high performance and high availability protection for critical ERP system running on SQL Server and Web Services in Hyper-V on SSD Storage.

To deliver full failover and disaster recovery protection, Van de Lande (VDL) built a Windows Server Failover Cluster (WSFC) system, with each node replicating data to the other. VDL use SIOS DataKeeper Cluster Edition software to ensure continuous availability of applications, databases and web services. SIOS DataKeeper software integrates with WSFC to create a ‘mirrored’ server system between two Windows cluster nodes.

Filed Under: Success Stories Tagged With: disaster recovery, High Performance Storage, Hyper V, SQL Server Failover Clusters

Special Offer For Microsoft MVPS – Free DataKeeper!

February 11, 2018 by Jason Aw Leave a Comment

For the MVPs out there

I just got the word that this is official and we are ready to ship software…

SIOS Technology is pleased to offer Microsoft MVP Community a fully functional two NFR copies of SteelEye DataKeeper Cluster Edition (DKCE).  DKCE enables SANless failover clustering solutions using any local attached storage. It enables high speed and highly available SMB 3.0 storage solutions for SQL Server and Hyper-V.

Common use cases of DKCE include SAN-less SQL Server Failover Cluster Instances using local high speed storage solutions like Fusion-io or even building clusters in the public cloud.  Another exciting possibility is highly available file servers on Windows Server 2012 for robust SMB 3.0 storage solutions for Hyper-V or SQL Server without having to purchase a shared SAS Array or SAN. Once again, you can take advantage of the blazing speeds possible with SSD or local flash based storage without sacrificing any availability. Be the first kid on your block to migrate your Hyper-V and SQL Server to SMB 3.0 and take advantage of faster failovers and easier storage management.

 Simply email datakeeper-mvp@us.sios.com  to learn how to get started with DataKeeper Cluster Edition!

MVPs grab your copy today and let me know what you think. The forum has invited you! I am monitoring the forum and I look forward to your feedback!

Reproduced with permission from https://clusteringformeremortals.com/2013/03/07/special-offer-for-microsoft-mvps-free-datakeeper/

Filed Under: Clustering Simplified Tagged With: Hyper V, Microsoft MVPS, MVP, SANless failover clustering solutions, SIOS DataKeeper Cluster Edition, SQL Server

Are Replicated Clusters With DataKeeper Better?

February 11, 2018 by Jason Aw Leave a Comment

Why Replicated Clusters With DataKeeper Are Better Than Single Copy SAN Based Clusters?

If you have followed the history of clustering as closely as I have for the past 10 years as a Microsoft Cluster MVP, you will notice that Microsoft has been steadily moving away from single copy clusters. It started with Windows Server 2003 with the elimination of a shared disk quorum and the introduction of majority node set quorums and the file share witness. The complaint with clusters based on shared disk quorums was that if the quorum became unavailable or corrupt, the entire cluster would fail. This was a major complaint and it was primarily what gave clustering a bad name in the early days.

Once the shared disk quorum was eliminated, people were still left with their application data residing on the cluster which was also a problem as the SAN was still a single point of failure in a cluster, a performance impediment and a management headache. Microsoft has begun to address those concerns with the introduction of Exchange 2007 CCR and Exchange 2010 DAGs as well as SQL Server 2008 R2 Database Mirroring. Microsoft has eliminated Exchange 2010 single copy clusters entirely and SQL Server single copy clusters are only still around because they haven’t perfected SQL Server replication yet.

The Introduction of SIOS DataKeeper

Hyper-V is the most recent cluster resource supported by Microsoft clustering that does not yet have a native cluster integrated replication solution. This is where SIOS DataKeeper fits in. We first demonstrated our DataKeeper Hyper-V replication solution at the Microsoft Virtualization launch in September of 2008 and have been providing HA and DR solutions for Hyper-V since Hyper-V was first introduced. Our solution is logo certified for Windows Server 2008 R2 as well as Hyper-V.

Why DataKeeper?

DataKeeper fills the gap left by single copy clusters as shown in the table below and subsequent paragraphs. The following customer story also highlights some of the reasons why people are adopting DataKeeper in lieu of SAN based solutions.

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240177361/University-shuns-HP-array-features-for-SIOS-host-based-replication

Are Replicated Clusters With DataKeeper Better?

Eliminates single point of failure

A SAN is a single entity made up of redundant pieces. To have a truly redundant SAN you need redundant controllers, power supplies, CPU’s, switches, UPS, RAM and the clients connecting to it need to have redundant NICs or HBAs and multi-path solutions configured. Even once you have eliminated hardware as a single point of failure, the SAN is still controlled by firmware which itself is a single point of failure. And then because the SAN resides in a single location, any physical disasters (think water, fire, etc.) also represents a risk.

I/O Performance

Given same disk specs, disk installed locally will perform better than disks stored on a SAN accessed via iSCSI. Also, using local storage opens up the possibility of using even higher speed storage solutions such as flash based PCIe storage which outperforms SANs that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars at a fraction of the costs.

Cost

Not only do you have to factor in the initial investment, which the DataKeeper solution wins by a significant percentage, you have to factor in the ongoing expense involved with maintenance, power and cooling required for any enterprise class SAN.

Supports future expansion for Disaster Recovery

Should disaster recovery solutions become a requirement in the future the DataKeeper solution can easily accommodate adding an addition Hyper-V node in a remote location in a multisite cluster configuration for a robust disaster recovery solution that includes the best RTO and RPO available. The SAN solution would require the purchase of an additional SAN, replication software and might not even include cluster integration as there are only a few solutions that actually integrate with failover clustering as well as DataKeeper does.

Eliminates Planned Downtime

With SAN based cluster solutions, any maintenance on the SAN requires planned downtime. The DataKeeper solution allows for rolling upgrades, meaning planned downtime for hardware maintenance is eliminated.

Eases management

SAN administration usually involves a SAN administrator who is familiar with the features and functionality of a SAN. The DataKeeper solution on the other hand is a simple software solution that is managed by the Windows Server administrator and features complete integration with Windows Server Failover Clustering, meaning the management is controlled through failover cluster, a tool which should be familiar with most Windows Administrators.

Summary

In summary, DataKeeper is able to provide a much more resilient cluster solution at a fraction of the cost of SAN based solutions.

Reproduced with permission from https://clusteringformeremortals.com/2013/02/07/why-replicated-clusters-with-datakeeper-are-better-than-single-copy-san-based-clusters/

Filed Under: Clustering Simplified Tagged With: clusters, DataKeeper, Hyper V, Replicated Clusters, SAN based Clusters, Single Copy, SIOS Datakeeper, SIOS DataKeeper Cluster Edition

Installing Windows Server 2012 RC On VMware Workstation Step-By-Step

February 4, 2018 by Jason Aw Leave a Comment

My take on Windows Server 2012 RC

With Windows Server 2012 RC being released just yesterday, I wanted to see if I could still install it on VMware Workstation as I had done with the Beta version before. The good news is that everything works beautifully. Here is a nice picture of my Windows Server 2012 RC running in VMware Workstation 8.

Installing Windows Server 2012 RC On VMware Workstation Step-By-Step

I was also able to install the Hyper-V Server 2012 RC as well without a problem.

Installing Windows Server 2012 RC On VMware Workstation Step-By-Step

There certainly are a few tricks to be aware of in order to get them to install, so please reference my previous article for the detailed instructions here.

It probably will only be a matter of time before I put Windows Server 8 RC on my laptop and switch to Hyper-V instead of VMware Workstation, but I’ll probably save that for another day when I don’t have some work to get done!

Reproduced with permission from https://clusteringformeremortals.com/2012/06/01/installing-windows-server-2012-rc-on-vmware-workstation-step-by-step/

Filed Under: Clustering Simplified Tagged With: Hyper V, VMware, windows server 2012 rc, Windows Server 8 RC

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